More women are earning as much as their husbands. So why are wives still doing the laundry?

New research shows that wives earn as much as their husbands in more marriages today than ever. 

So why do men still spend more time at work, relaxing and socializing and less time mopping floors,cooking dinner and picking up kids from school than their spouses?

Most of the time when we talk about gender equality, we focus on the workplace where women are sharply underrepresented at the top, face discrimination in hiring and promotions and are paid less for the same work. But gender disparities don’t just happen from 9 to 5. 

"The gender gap in unpaid work has been narrowing, but the reality remains that married mothers do more unpaid work than single mothers," said Aliya Hamid Rao, an assistant professor in the department of methodology at the London School of Economics and author of “Crunch Time: How Married Couples Confront Unemployment.”

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Number of wives earning as much as their husbands triples

Men are still the main breadwinners in more than half of opposite-sex marriages but the share of women who earn as much or more than their husbands has tripled over the past 50 years, according to a new study from the Pew Research Center.

In about a third of marriages – 29% – husbands and wives earn roughly the same. In 16% of marriages, wives are the breadwinners.

Doing the laundry and taking care of kids still viewed as women's work

But housework and caregiving responsibilities are still widely considered women’s work, according to Pew.

Only when the wife is the sole breadwinner do husbands spend more time on caregiving responsibilities. Even then, wives and husbands devote about the same amount of time to housework.

“As women start earning more than their husbands, and especially as they get closer to being the sole breadwinner, we see that women do more housework,” Rao said.

Gender equality? Husbands spend more time socializing than cleaning the house

Even in marriages where both spouses earn 40% to 50% of the couple’s combined earnings, husbands spend about 3.5 hours more a week socializing and relaxing than wives do, according to Pew. They also spend more time on work they get paid for: 44.2 hours vs. 41.1 on average.

Wives in these marriages spend roughly 2 hours more per week on caregiving than husbands do and about 2.5 hours more on housework. They also spend 3 or more hours on caregiving a week on average. 

In marriages where wives bring home the bacon, men have significantly more leisure time – 9 hours a week on average – while the time they devote to childcare and housework remains about the same. 

Only when wives are the only breadwinners do men spend more time on caregiving than their wives. Husbands in these marriages have the most leisure time of all: 47.2 hours a week.

Society values men's roles at work more than at home

A majority of Americans say that society values men’s roles at work more than their roles at home, according to a Pew survey. And 49% say that women’s contributions at work and at home are valued equally with 31% saying the work women do at home is valued more. 

Why are women still saddled with domestic chores? Blame old-school social norms.

Researchers speculate that women who outearn their husbands take on more domestic chores “to uphold the normative order of how a family should be,” Rao said.

Other factors include women's socialization, gendered expectations in education and assumptions about women's "natural suitability" for domestic chores, Rao says.

And then there are the pressures on men to be breadwinners and the fact that men still do, on the whole, earn more, she said.

Division of labor: What's the solution?

So, do men just need to pitch in more with childcare and housework? Yes, but it's complicated.

Individual choices won't move the needle. Policy changes are the key to changing social norms, Rao says.

The U.S. needs affordable childcare and a national paid parental leave policy and Americans need more flex-time and options to work remotely to rebalance how household responsibilities are divvied up, she said.

“I really think this is a lot about what social policies and support structures are in place that allow men and women to participate fully in paid work and at home,” she said.